Commemoration of the 1400th anniversary of the death of Prince Shengde

◆ Wang Yayuan, a reporter of Japan's New Overseas Chinese Daily

In Japan, before the official opening of large-scale exhibitions, there are usually "in-house exhibitions", which is what we call "preview exhibitions" in China. From April 27 to June 20, the Nara National Museum in Nara, Japan, held a special exhibition to commemorate the 1400th anniversary of prince Shengde's (574-622) death anniversary, "Prince Shengde and Horyuji Temple". On April 26, the Nara National Museum also held a "preview exhibition".

Speaking of the Japanese Prince Ofeku 1400 years ago, we will recall that Japan had begun to pursue "equality" in Sino-Japanese relations. The most famous "duanzi" is that Prince Shengde asked Emperor Tuigu to write in the "National Book" to the Chinese Sui Emperor that "the sunrise is the son of heaven to the day is not where the son of heaven is", that is to say, the Japanese emperor of Tuigu and the Sui emperor of China are all equal "sons of heaven", only the region - "where the sun rises" and "where the sun does not", and there is no distinction between high and low. It is very much like contemporary international diplomacy that "all countries, no matter how big or small, are equal" flavor.

However, if we only stare at this kind of "paragraph", we will ignore the essence of many histories. Importantly, during the reign of Prince Shengde, against the background of the continued tension in the east Asian region, he sent "Sui envoys" to China, which led to the "dispatch of Tang envoys" for hundreds of years. During this period, the "great reform" that imitated China's political and economic establishment made An epoch-making "qualitative" leap forward in Japan from a slave society to a feudal society.

That is to say, during the term of office of Prince Shengde, by virtue of "peace" with China, rather than "resistance" with China, Japan's development was brought about. At that time, after Japan felt that China was "strong," it actively absorbed Chinese culture, "localized" Chinese culture, and took the word "harmony" as the first word, and kept up with the establishment, thus creating a new development path for Japan.

Today, as Japan commemorates the 1,400th anniversary of the death of Prince Shengde, I wonder if there is a new view of this history. ■